Welcome to the latest episode of the Seibertron.com Twincast / Podcast! This episode features your host ScottyP with Thing 1 & Thing 2: Megatronus and RodimusConvoy13. Listen in as we discuss the latest news, toys, and more.

We start out with a little Rescue Bots appreciation. Traversing its 100th episode in season 4, Rescue Bots has surpassed (US) G1 in episode count. The Twincast crew ponders Rescue Bots' staying power, and what aspects of the show have cultivated loyalty in fans old and young alike.

Robot dinosaurs from space make every show a classic.

We take a look at Optimus Prime #3, from Soundwave's evolving relationships, to our growing enjoyment of and engagement with Zama's excellent artwork, to our boundless love for all things Junkion. Bonus: our official Seibertron.com review can be found here.

The art is seriously good.

Lost Light #2 is next, and we are deep into the functionist hellscape, err... rabbit hole. While the implications of Megatron's existence weigh heavy, there is only one thing truly on our minds: All hail the useless one. If that wasn't teaser enough, our official Seibertron.com review can be found here.

Lonely, and useless.

In light (he he) of Screenrant's article declaring Lost Light the greatest story in the franchise, and our observation of stray comments exhorting a return to G1 cartoon source material in terms of content and form, we ask: What drives this desire, aside from the obvious draw of nostalgia? Is it recall bias, or something else entirely? Think of this one as a conversation starter and let us know what you think by replying to this post!

A new generation of stories, for the next evolution of the brand.

Back to toys: Toy Fair 2017 is just a couple short weeks away, and as always, our expectations run high. What reveals does the Twincast crew predict this year, and in a perfect world, what would we like to see?

I repeat: Robot dinosaurs from space make every show a classic.

The Power of the Prime vote is underway, with the second and final round of voting coming to a close. Who are we voting for, and what can we hope for under Deathsaurus Prime's leadership?

Unknown Evil, every time.

The 10th anniversary of the Bayverse continues: in addition to Takara's 'The Best' line of premium movie figure redecos, it appears we can also expect Transformers AU X converting cell phones. We're not quite sure what to do with these.

Hard pass.

Bragging Rights is here. What has everyone gotten since their last recording? And what kind of cocktail would you be mixing up?

Girls just wanna have fu-un!

We'll be back in approximately two weeks to discuss reveals from Toy Fair 2017, more comics, and Masterpiece Cheetor!

| Love us? Hate us? Extra Super Love us? Drop us a review on iTunes. || Want to keep the discussion going? You can do so by simply replying to this post! || Got a question for the Twincast? Ask the Twincast. |

Cobotron wrote:Hey! You seemed to have attracted a wild Megatronus. They're hard to find, but boy are they fun when you catch one!

Not listened the the Cast yet, but had to say, in my opinion, anyone demanding to go back to the (well loved by me) G1 cartoon storyline is short sighted and blinkered. The world has changed so much since then! Why on earth should we go back in time? Madness says I. Madness.

Big Grim wrote:Not listened the the Cast yet, but had to say, in my opinion, anyone demanding to go back to the (well loved by me) G1 cartoon storyline is short sighted and blinkered. The world has changed so much since then! Why on earth should we go back in time? Madness says I. Madness.

I will listen this week, but wanted to point out that the cellphone promotion thing is between AU (Japanese phone carrier) and Transformers - the 'x' is just symbol for 'crossover'! It's not called AU X, it's AU cross Transformers.

That's not to say that I don't still enjoy the original Sunbow cartoon. I think an up to date version would eclipse Netflix's Voltron if done right. An animated direct to video movie of LSOTW is something I've been asking for for years now.

I think the divide comes when people who clearly hate G1 focus on the dumbest comments/opinions and use those as the general consensus of all G1 fans. Yes, I am aware of how crappy some of the G1 episodes were. No I don't want a season 4.5 or 5 picking up where it left off. Some gimmicks with the Generations toy line work and some do not.

A new animated show with G1's soul (and no not that Machinima Combiner Wars garbage) that borrows from IDW's take would be nice. Preferably the parts Simon Furman, James Roberts and "some" that John Barbers wrote.

Again, I agree with this. IDW is my G1 now. I'll always have a soft spot for the old cartoon, flaws and all and I love Furman's G1 comics from the Marvel days. But Now? IDW Transformers is a perfect G1 for the world as we know it now in my opinion.

YoungPrime wrote:A new animated show with G1's soul (and no not that Machinima Combiner Wars garbage) that borrows from IDW's take would be nice. Preferably the parts Simon Furman, James Roberts and "some" that John Barbers wrote.

Perhaps, yeah. It'll never happen I reckon but it could be good. Thing is, it's likely have to start with the war in full swing, like you imply by asking for the Furman stuff. I love Furman but I think the IDW stuff has moved too far away from that era now.

What I'm loving about IDW's run is that the War is over and we're seeing what comes after. I've always liked Megatron as a character but now I love him. He has been amazingly fleshed out to the point that the BIGGEST, BADDEST Decepticon Warlord is a...sympathetic figure?!? How on earth did that happen? It's great! And I'm looking forward to seeing where this is going, what with him being in the Functionist Universe now, seeing a world where he did not start the good fight before he, as he himself said, lost his way.

I think Voltron got away with what it got away with - being awesome and clearly targeted to adults - because of the freedom granted by (1) Netflix and (2) merchandising as an afterthought (at best). Transformers may have the former, but never the latter, and so it's hard for me to see something similar come down the line in the near future, but it's still a definite hope and possibility..

I think seamlessly alternating between the dark grittiness of Prime and the fun of RID is the right balance for our demographic, and pretty close to the balance Voltron represents, in my mind anyway. I guess we'll see if the growing appeal of these re-energized (dare I say reformatted?) G1 characters yields some more mainstream animated fruit down the line.

Cobotron wrote:Hey! You seemed to have attracted a wild Megatronus. They're hard to find, but boy are they fun when you catch one!

I didn't like the Swearth story at first, but I've warmed to it and I would not say that "nothing came of it." Instead, what the story does is really develop Swerve, not in terms of all the sitcom stuff, but rather the fact that he's so personally and physically destroyed and not taking care of himself.

Anode and Lug are getting too much page time for characters that aren't endearing or haven't had a compelling curiosity moment. Velocity doesn't trust them and neither do I. I don't think they can be qualified as a distraction though. Page space is too valuable to spend this much time on her. Something is up with them and the problem is that we have no reason to care at all.

Tailgate is another unwanted and languishing character development trend that is a detraction from the core story. The worst part about him is what he's doing to Cyclonus. Humanizing Cyclonus is one thing, but seeing him more caught up in Tailgate's gravity than he previous character arcs is unappealing. In short, more Cyclonus, less Cyclonus-Tailgate relationship blaaah.

The Flatheads...isn't that simply empurata and not shadowplay?

I feel like Rodimus' immaturity is a bit that he does. There are moments when his seriousness cuts through and it's always kind of surprising, like when he reminds Ultra Magnus that he is the captain of the ship early in the series.

On the IDW comic discussion and the comment about Rumble and Frenzy's true alliance being more Decepticon than with Soundwave... I just started to re-read IDW from the very beginning, trying to catch what all I have missed reading from the get go... literally I just finished re-reading Megatron Origin, and from what I could tell Rumble and Frenzy were two of the miners who attacked the senator when they closed the mine. They were with Megatron there, and with him talking when Soundwave came out of the shadows in like issue 2. It was really cool hearing you guys discuss this during the cast and then seeing it by finding the continuity that had been setup back in 07!

On that point it amazed me to see the first glimpse of Sentinel Prime looking like he does in Titans Return the first time you see him in Origins, but then ditching that look for his more Senatorial look.

Also for a Twincast or forum question... Looking at how Sentinel put on his Senatorial face, do you think it would be cool if Hasbro would take advantage of the Titans and provide us with the alternate heads. I mean officially released headmasters to recreate Sentinels's non-face plate face (especially knowing in fiction he is a head master), or provide us with a non-face plated Brainstorm. I know that there are 3D printed options, but I personally would like to have seen Hasbro use this price point for things like this. On another note, seeing Sentinel's upgraded armor in Origins, made me remember how awesome it was for FansProject to release the initial City Commander armor... What are the upgrades that you wish your official products had available like I really wish that my Titans Return Sentinel Prime had an upgrade kit to refelect his powered up state after re-reading.

Counterpunch wrote:I didn't like the Swearth story at first, but I've warmed to it and I would not say that "nothing came of it." Instead, what the story does is really develop Swerve, not in terms of all the sitcom stuff, but rather the fact that he's so personally and physically destroyed and not taking care of himself.

Anode and Lug are getting too much page time for characters that aren't endearing or haven't had a compelling curiosity moment. Velocity doesn't trust them and neither do I. I don't think they can be qualified as a distraction though. Page space is too valuable to spend this much time on her. Something is up with them and the problem is that we have no reason to care at all.

I think I would've been totally fine with Swearth had it been a parallel plot running alongside something else. Instead it was 22 pages of sitcom. I can appreciate what it did for character development, but it's one of the few issues of the book - actually, the only one - that I skim through on re-readings.

I'd argue that they're distracting in the "build heat" kind of way. You see them and go "ah man, this again?" but then you do like me and don't realize Kaput was the same bot hanging out with Rung and Alpha Trion while OP got mission briefed in Spotlight: Orion Pax. Then you hate them more, which I assume is intentional. Between them, Aileron (whom I know you also hate), and the things going on in TAAO there are some sinister lady robots doing sinister things right now. I assume the tensions between Anode and Velocity, Pyra Magna and Aileron, along with those between the Carcerians and Camiens in TAAO, are going to be a focal point. We just found out about some tie to Liege Maximo, and Caminus is Solus Prime's colony, and this is really starting to sound like the Covenant of Primus where Solus and Maximo had an uneasy relationship at best. I meant to dig around today for Roboid mentions outside of MTMTE but it got late.

Incomplete thought: "The Lighthouse" and snowflake probably have something to do with "The Farm" and it ties back to the end of MTMTE 46 as well which goes hand in hand with the cog symbol thing which might now I'm thinking have something to do with the Maximo/Quintus/Megatronus alliance. Crud, I'm gonna have to re-read some of CoP, aren't I, CP?

kuhlio wrote:On the IDW comic discussion and the comment about Rumble and Frenzy's true alliance being more Decepticon than with Soundwave... I just started to re-read IDW from the very beginning, trying to catch what all I have missed reading from the get go... literally I just finished re-reading Megatron Origin, and from what I could tell Rumble and Frenzy were two of the miners who attacked the senator when they closed the mine. They were with Megatron there, and with him talking when Soundwave came out of the shadows in like issue 2. It was really cool hearing you guys discuss this during the cast and then seeing it by finding the continuity that had been setup back in 07!

On that point it amazed me to see the first glimpse of Sentinel Prime looking like he does in Titans Return the first time you see him in Origins, but then ditching that look for his more Senatorial look.

Also for a Twincast or forum question... Looking at how Sentinel put on his Senatorial face, do you think it would be cool if Hasbro would take advantage of the Titans and provide us with the alternate heads. I mean officially released headmasters to recreate Sentinels's non-face plate face (especially knowing in fiction he is a head master), or provide us with a non-face plated Brainstorm. I know that there are 3D printed options, but I personally would like to have seen Hasbro use this price point for things like this. On another note, seeing Sentinel's upgraded armor in Origins, made me remember how awesome it was for FansProject to release the initial City Commander armor... What are the upgrades that you wish your official products had available like I really wish that my Titans Return Sentinel Prime had an upgrade kit to refelect his powered up state after re-reading.

Glad you enjoyed the discussion! I want to answer your questions, but I think I also want to save them for the next episode

Fiiiiiinally got round to finishing this as I worked, and copied down some notes.

I didn't mean to pull you up on Zama's art Scotty! I was just a comment on her influences, sorry if tone got lost!

Note on Tailgate. Follow me on this one: Tailgate was almost our new reader POV character right? He knows nothing of the war or anything around it and we bumble along with him for two macroarcs. Now we have Anode and Lug, who clearly have more about them going on, but Tailgate is - as you put it - now arrogant, immature, thinks he knows what's what to the point of obnoxiousness.

Could we keep the 'reader' metaphor running, and see him as not-as-new entitled fans of the book? We started as annoying but curious learners, and some of us just took it and ran with it and are now arrogant, patronising foils who just leave wrecks around us. The metaphor isn't a snug fit, but it amused me. (JRo wouldn't be past doing this sort of thing, either.)

The whole IDW/G1/redoing thing sparked a very good thread with Ironhidensh, I'll keep plugging it until you all mention it. ( I know Counterpunch has picked up on this already, and I've seen others reply too. )

In terms of redoing old stuff in a new way in general though - I'm not sure I entirely get the redos period that we're going through in media in general, so not sure I'd go back to any previous incarnation of a film or series just because. It can work, sure, but why?That series still exists. Why do it again beat by beat? (cf liveaction Disney, for an out of TF example)

Sidenote on Makoto Shinkai: latest film, kimi no nawa, is excellent in the ways that ScottyP says about story can be lacking but all other parts are not, with an up in the story writing this time. I wrote a review on it!

Va'al wrote:Sidenote on Makoto Shinkai: latest film, kimi no nawa, is excellent in the ways that ScottyP says about story can be lacking but all other parts are not, with an up in the story writing this time. I wrote a review on it!

It is the end of my day, so more later, but wanted to mention that I found Garden of Words after looking for Kimi no Nawa and seeing that it was way too new to be available yet! Very much looking forward to it, it has some very strong buzz.

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